


Warning signs

by orphan_account



Category: Football RPF
Genre: Angst and Porn, Denial of Feelings, M/M, Strangers to Lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-02
Updated: 2014-09-02
Packaged: 2018-02-15 22:16:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2245302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“They say cowardice is infectious; but then, on the other hand, so is love. The question which remains is, in the end, which one will win?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Warning signs

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mjp](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mjp/gifts).



> You were my first inspiration for this ship, and therefore also the first inspiration for this story. Writing this, it's been an equivalent to hell, because I never feel like I get these two on paper properly, in the same way they portray themselves in my head. I suggest you listen to [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eg6-5vmCZc) song before reading it, it kind of sets the dynamic of Fernando's and Daniel's relationship.
> 
> All I can say is, I tried, and I hope you'll like it.

Some things in life Daniel just didn’t do. Ironing his laundry, making his bed when he rolls out of it in the morning, eating at what people considered a normal time. Listening to the warning signs. Oh, and warning signs there were. Daniel just didn’t care about them.

The minute his wandering eyes stop at a body leaning against the bar, alarm bells are ringing in his head. He ignores them as he takes a sip of his whiskey, the liquid burning in his throat while he keeps on staring at the stranger. The man has blonde hair, the strands falling alongside his face like a frame, high cheekbones and a smile to die for. The music in the club is dark, heavy, going through every fibre of Daniel’s being as he lingers in the shadows of the people invading the space between him and the man at the bar.

Somehow, their eyes meet and Daniel holds his gaze. He knows it makes people uncomfortable whenever he looks at them like this. Unforgiving, studying, judging. And he expects this pretty stranger at the bar to avert his eyes quickly.

But he doesn’t. The blonde’s upper lip curls up sardonically and as he moves away from the bar, his lips curve into a full smile. He’s coming over. Daniel knows it should have been the first warning sign, because people never make their way over to him. It’s always the other way around. He is the one invading other people’s personal space, making them shudder with a lingering touch on a hip, a thigh, anywhere. He looks at them like he knows every single secret they have buried deep down, he makes people surrender. But not this time.

The stranger’s hips sway languidly as he moves through the crowd, the people parting for him like grass parts for the snake slithering its way through. When he’s closer, that’s when Daniel notices the countless freckles splattered across his skin like a galaxy of its own.

“Hello.”

His voice is softer than Daniel expected, it’s like the wind making the surface of the ocean flutter. It sounds too warm, too sweet for someone looking so sinful. Sinful. It turns out to be the perfect characterisation for him and even though Daniel doesn’t know that yet, he can definitely feel it in the way the blonde moves closer to him. His instincts tell him to take a step back, to move away, but he doesn’t want to. He wants to know how far the blonde is willing to go. As he can count the golden lashes on his eyelids, Daniel mutters back an, “Hello.”

“I don’t think I have ever seen you here before,” the blonde says. It’s his voice. Daniel remembers a book he once read, an American classic. There was a woman, whose voice had a singing compulsion, an arrangement of notes which made men go wild. It was full of promises and people said of her: “Her voice is full of money.” Daniel stays silent, staring at the stranger and realising his voice is full of something as well, but it isn’t money. This blonde’s voice is full of sex.

“Lost your tongue, big boy?” the blonde says, his eyes smiling but his mouth isn’t. “Oh, how I hope not,” he adds, a lilting sound to the ‘t’.

Daniel blinks, clears his throat. “My name is Daniel,” he says, grey eyes meeting brown ones in a shared stare, their eyes soft.

“Nice to meet you, Daniel,” the blonde’s eyelashes flutter in a way that makes Daniel wonder if he’s born to be seducing. “I’m Fernando.”

“Sweet name for someone who isn’t.”

Fernando’s eyes widen slightly in amusement, tongue peeking out to lick at his full lower lip. It curves up into a smile when he sees Daniel’s eyes following. “You don’t think I’m sweet, Daniel?” Fernando asks innocently, swaying his hips as he steps in closer and resting one hand on Daniel’s abdomen.

“Sweet combines with innocence combines with saints, and you don’t look so innocent and saint-like to me.” Daniel’s eyes cast down to where Fernando is pressing his hand against his ribs.

Fernando’s white teeth shimmer in the dark light of the club, the hand pressing harder against Daniel until he’s forced to take a step back. Fernando curves against his front as his back comes in contact with the cold wall. “You know what they say about saints and sinners, Daniel?” His breathing is warm, his voice low against Daniel’s ear. “They may be separated by their actions, but they are united by their reception of passion. The saints are just cowards not admitting to it.”

Daniel feels Fernando’s lean, hard body against his own, his fingers clutching and releasing the flimsy fabric of the blonde’s shirt. He feels Fernando grinning against his neck, heat radiating between them with every breath they share, with every time they lean in but not completely. “Passion?” Daniel asks, his voice getting lost in the low bass of the music. “That is what you want?”

Fernando’s eyes are dark when they meet his, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows thickly. “What I want, is you.”

-

Daniel groans, his hand harshly slamming against the headboard which makes the bed creak more than it’s already doing. Fernando’s on all fours, face pressed sideways into the pillow and his body rocking along with the furious thrusts Daniel’s giving him. Grunts and moans spill off his lips with every movement, his body shaking with the pulling, pushing and trashing it has to endure. He takes everything Daniel is giving to him, he exposes himself for the other man in a way he rarely exposes himself. His knees are digging into the mattress, his pale, milky thighs and arse crimson red from the spanking Daniel gave him. Sultry words slip off of his lips like honey, Daniel licking the pleas away from him in an open-mouthed kiss. He can’t keep his hands off of Fernando’s ass, kneading the red mounds of flesh in his hands and grinding his hips against them, his length buried deep inside Fernando.

The blonde’s hands are alternating rapidly between grabbing the sheets, holding onto the headboard or reaching back to scratch at whatever part of Daniel's body he can reach. It makes the dark-haired man go light-headed and with an angry twist he pulls out of Fernando, leaving him open and whining.

“Wh-what are you doing?” Fernando’s voice sounds utterly wrecked from the blowjob he’d given Daniel in the car, his eyes still blazing with untamed fire even though Daniel moves off of the bed. He stares at Daniel’s naked backside, only now seeing the tattoos adorning the pale flesh of the other man’s back. His reverie of looking at the artwork is short-lived because Daniel turns around, pushes his face back into the pillow and leans down over him, his cock heavy and slick against his arse. “You need to learn how to keep your hands to yourself,” he mutters lowly, dangerously in the blonde’s ear. “Who knows, someone might get the wrong  idea?”

Daniel pulls harshly on Fernando’s arms, ignores Fernando’s muffled protests as he holds his wrists together with one hand, winding a silver tie around them with his free hand. Fernando lets out a string of curses when Daniel pushes back into his heat, the tight channel guiding him back in and he stares down at the impossible curve of Fernando’s back, the way his hole clenches and tightens around his thick cock buried deep inside of his yearning, pleading body. Seeing Fernando’s hands tied on his back as he tries to keep himself up with his shoulders is what makes Daniel let go, pushing, shoving into his hole, fucking him hard.

He won’t let Fernando take away his control during sex, no matter how _possessed_ the blonde makes him feel whenever he talks. Fernando’s helpless wails for more are better music to his ears than anyone before him ever made and Daniel stills his hips once more, balls deep inside of Fernando and feeling like he’s flying. Perfect. “More, hm?” His voice is rough, the sounds coming from the back of his throat. “Does the innocent blondie want more?”

Fernando turns his head sideways, his hair clinging to his sweaty forehead. “Fuck you,” he spits out, eyes pure venom when Daniel leans down and meets them.

“Nuh-uh,” Daniel tuts darkly, “Fuck _you_.” He grinds his hips against Fernando’s arse to emphasize the words, feels the body below him stiffening and then quivering in pleasure.

“Don’t be so fucking proud of yourself,” Fernando grits out between his teeth, “You’re not God’s fucking gift.”

Daniel’s laugh is loud and emotionless, echoing in the dark bedroom. “Your body begs to differ,” he says, patronisingly shoving his cock back inside Fernando, a grin plastered onto his face as he feels Fernando shuddering and moaning brokenly underneath him.

“That doesn’t, mean, anything,” Fernando manages to choke out between the furious pounces, tears of pleasure and bliss clinging to his lashes and his wrists are crying red with the tie still bound tightly around them.

“Do you ever just fucking shut up?!” Daniel suddenly shouts in frustration, both hands gripping harshly onto Fernando’s hips as he pushes into him.

Fernando smirks, “Fucking make me.”

And Daniel does. He fucks Fernando like he wants to destroy him, wants to make him worthless when he’s done with him and all Fernando does is smile wider because this, this is what he wants. It’s what he wanted the second he saw Daniel in the club, and he knew he would get it the second the other man threw him onto his bed like a prize he won. Daniel is happy Fernando doesn’t see his face, it makes it easier for him to pound inside of him and to wreck him completely.

He bites down unforgivingly on Fernando’s shoulder as he comes, filling up the condom with his seed and he pushes Fernando over the edge with a flick of his thumb along the slit of Fernando’s cock, come spurting onto their hands and the sheets.

The moment he collapses down next to Fernando, the blonde struggles out of his bondage and flicks the tie in Daniel’s face. “Arsehole,” he grits out between his teeth, his fingers shaking from the power of his orgasm. Daniel just chuckles breathily before pulling Fernando into an obscenely harsh kiss, shutting both of them up.

-

Despite telling themselves it was a one-time thing, Daniel and Fernando gravitate back towards each other. Daniel relishes in the burst of adrenaline he gets whenever Fernando takes over the conversation, dirty-talking him into almost coming in his pants, and Fernando can’t help but squirm in his seat every time something reminds him of the nights he spends with Daniel, tied-up and being taken, feeling worthless when he comes all over the sheets but satiated when he collapses down onto the mattress.

They’re leading themselves towards the edge of a cliff and they know it. It’s just that neither of the two makes the first move to stop it from happening.

-

Daniel keeps ignoring the warning signs, takes Fernando out to dinner solely to wind him up by running his hand up and down Fernando’s thigh throughout the meal. They drink wine, eat a three-course meal and Daniel even hands his phone to the waiter for a romantic picture together, their cheeks blushing from the wine and Fernando’s brown eyes are glazed over. Daniel doesn’t see it.

They fuck that night, in the kitchen because Fernando was clawing at Daniel’s shirt and the dark-haired man was too drunk to make their way over to the bedroom. Fernando’s back is beautiful, Daniel licking, sucking, kissing his way down to his tailbone before Fernando’s whining, nearly crying because he’s drunk and he craves sex and wants Daniel to take him.

Daniel tears the condom wrapper with his teeth, rolling the latex down his hard length. Using nothing more but spit as lube, Daniel pushes inside Fernando’s body, the heat clenching around him making the room spin, or maybe it’s the way Fernando’s panting, pleading, “Baby, baby more, give me more,” because it sounds so wrecked, so broken-down and perfect. Fernando holds on tightly to the edge of the kitchen counter, his hips rocking back to meet Daniel’s thrusts.

The last thing Daniel notes before losing himself into Fernando, is that the blonde is starting to break down quicker for him.

-

Daniel goes along with Fernando to an art gallery opening when the blonde asks him. He doesn’t want to go, never having been the person who has the patience and the interest in things like canvasses and paint. But Fernando asks him mid-blowjob and all Daniel remembers is saying yes to something because it made Fernando continue.

But now he’s standing here, in a brightly lit engine house which is somehow artistic according to Fernando. His suit is uncomfortable, the fabric of his button-down soft but not as soft as his ACDC tees and sweaters and his shoes; he doesn’t even begin to think about his uncomfortable shoes.

He smiles, shakes hands and meets people whose names he forgets immediately. He’s surprised at the way Fernando blends in perfectly, his voice not only having impact on Daniel as it seems because everyone is clinging to every word he says, with his brown eyes twinkling and his cheeks pink. Fernando finishes sentences for Daniel when the other man forgets what he was saying or simply isn’t interested enough to keep on talking. When at one point Fernando starts holding his hand, Daniel doesn’t shake him off. It’s cold inside the gallery, Daniel vaguely recalling Fernando telling him why temperature is so important for the art, and his hands are cold as well. He doesn’t mind Fernando holding his hand.

Fernando stands close to him when the group photo is being taken, both of them tall so they stand a little towards the back of the group. Daniel feels Fernando’s hand against his abdomen, the blonde standing sideways and angling his body towards his. He lies his hand on Fernando’s lower back, smirking when he sees Fernando blushing. He figures Fernando’s probably sexually frustrated because normally they have different things to do on their Friday nights.

They manage to sneak off in the bathrooms, locking the door behind them. Fernando’s resting his head into the crook of Daniel’s neck while Daniel jerks him off, the tight ring of his fingers making Fernando pant against his skin, sucking a hickey as well. Daniel inhales the scent of Fernando’s hair, smells his shampoo and he smiles, speeding up his jerks when he hears Fernando’s breathing hitching. He pushes Fernando’s pants down with his free hand to grab a handful of his arse, humming contently in Fernando’s ear. “Are you going to come for me?” he whispers in Fernando’s ear.

Fernando nods his head, eyes screwed close in pleasure when Daniel presses a finger against the vein in his cock as he jerks him off. Daniel feels Fernando’s knees shaking before buckling and he reaches up his hand, curving his arm tightly around Fernando’s body and pulling him against his own. Their eyes meet, the tension between them pulled taut by their stare.

Daniel leans in, presses his lips against Fernando’s cheekbone. “Come for me, Nando, sweetheart, come for me.”

Fernando gasps sharply, his body straining completely before he’s coming in Daniel’s hand, his moans smothered by Daniel’s lips, who is grinning smugly. Again, he drives right past another warning sign.

-

“Fernando, there is someone here for you,” Juan says, opening the door of Fernando’s office a little further. Daniel walks in past Juan, his motorcycle helmet wedged underneath his arm and a smile breaks through on Fernando’s lips at the unimpressed smirk on Daniel’s face. “Thank you, Juan. That will be it for today, enjoy the weekend,” he says, nodding at his assistant. Juan just gives a smile back, not questioning the reason why he’s been let go two hours earlier than normal.

Daniel just follows the way of the assistant with his eyes as Juan leaves Fernando’s office, grabbing some paperwork on his way. “He looks at you like you’re an angel.” He lies his helmet down on one of the chairs and shrugs off his leather jacket.

Fernando’s upper lip curls up. “Hmm, but I am, aren’t I?” he smiles sweetly, sitting on the edge of his desk and tugging Daniel closer by his shirt. Daniel just grins, his simple peck on Fernando’s lips leaving the blonde with tingly fingers and he looks up at Daniel when the other man moves in closer, pressing their hips flush against each other. “Why are you here, by the way? You’ve never come to my office before.”

Daniel raises his eyebrow. “Am I not allowed to stop by and see my sexy lover in a suit and bossing everyone around?” He leans in, nibbling on Fernando’s earlobe. “It’s quite the change from when I have you begging underneath me.”

Fernando feels heat spreading through his lower back and he looks up coyly, noticing the way Daniel’s eyes seem to darken with lust. “Begging, me? Never, and especially not here. I think you have me confused with someone else, Daniel Agger,” he whispers against the other man’s lips.

He lets out a sharp gasp when Daniel grabs his arse, gripping the mounds of flesh in his hands. Daniel chuckles breathily, his voice low when he says, “Oh no, I’m not confusing anything.” He pulls Fernando closer to him, their hardening cocks sliding against each other through the fabric. Fernando lets out a shaky breath when Daniel rubs his cock, feels himself straining in the tight confinement of his clothes. “You like this, hm?” Daniel whispers huskily. “You love the fact that I come in here, catch in your most powerful position only to touch and turn you into a moaning, shaking mess for me. I want to fuck you over your desk, pound into your arse until you come all over yourself and those fucking papers you’re always going on about.”

Fernando feels his legs turning weak with every word Daniel whispers against his skin and he claws at the flimsy shirt his lover’s wearing, moving himself so he’s sitting on the desk. “Do it, please Dan, fuck me.” His eyes are fire-blazed with need as he pulls Daniel’s shirt over his head, shrugging of his own dress jacket and unbuttoning the top three buttons of his white shirt.

Daniel just grins before he gets down onto his knees, unbuckling Fernando’s belt and tugging the pants down his narrow hips, his boxer briefs following. He licks around Fernando’s shaft before taking the head between his lips and suckling on it. “Fuck, Dan!” Fernando groans out, his hands pushing at some reports and papers, laptop landing in his chair before he’s lying back onto his desk, feeling the cold mahogany against his shoulders. Daniel follows, gets up onto his feet and places his hands on Fernando’s hips, sliding his lips down lower on his length.

He doesn’t know why he’s giving Fernando a blowjob, he never does it, doesn’t like the taste. But Fernando’s grabbing at his hair, his hips stuttering against his hands and the sounds coming from his lips, oh. Daniel moans and takes Fernando deeper, his tongue lapping around his cock and feeling the heat sliding down his throat as he swallows. “S-Shit, Dan, oh my God!” Fernando’s thighs are tensed, his arse lifting off the desk as Daniel deep throats him again, feeling his cock disappearing into the tight cavern. “St-stop, baby stop, I’ll come,” Fernando babbles, too far gone in pleasure to be ashamed of his reactions to Daniel’s mouth on his cock.

Daniel slides his lips off Fernando’s cock, wiping the back of his mouth before he moves to tower above the blonde, his eyes gleaming wickedly. “What’s wrong, _sweetheart_?” He singsongs the endearment. “Desperate for my cock in your tight arse already?”

Fernando just moans when he hears the zip on Daniel’s jeans sliding down, a condom being thrown onto his partly bare chest. Daniel jerks himself off, lifting up his hand and tapping Fernando’s lower lip with two fingers. “Suck,” he commands, not slowing down the tugging on his own cock. Fernando opens his mouth, licking, sucking around the digits to get them wet and slippery. His eyes lock with Daniel’s, both of them staying silent for a few seconds while they just stare at each other. Daniel feels the pleasure in his lower abdomen mixing with something else, a different kind of warmth which he can also see in Fernando’s eyes whenever he looks at him for too long.

He pulls his fingers back harshly, breaking the eye-contact and he reaches in between Fernando’s butt cheeks, finding his pucker and pushing in the first digit. Fernando’s eyes roll back, a soft moan spreading from his lips like the first note of a symphony. Daniel spreads Fernando with his fingers, the tight heat around them making him dizzy with want. He’s never fucked someone for longer than four months, but here he is, fingering his lover inside his office and he stops his own train of thoughts by pulling back his fingers and ripping open the condom wrapper, thanking the gods for having taken a pre-lubricated one. He rolls it down his length and jerks himself a few times before positioning his cock at Fernando’s hole.

The second he pushes himself past the initial resistance, he’s back to floating again. He’s fully aware of the fact that he’s fucking Fernando face-to-face for the first time but as he buries himself inside until the hilt, every coherent thought flies away from his mind.

Fernando’s mewling, lifting up his legs and hooking them over Daniel’s shoulders, the other man gripping down onto his thighs as he pulls out and shoves back in again. Something on the desk rattles, falling to the ground with a soft thud and before Fernando can think he must’ve forgotten to take that off the desk, Daniel’s kissing him, his tongue pushing past his lips and dancing with his own while he’s feeling the furious thrusting against his backside rippling through him in waves of pleasure.

“Sh-Shit, Daniel, I-I love, love you,” he moans out, his voice high and strained. His fingers curl around the edge of his desk, desperately searching to hold onto something and his eyes screw close.

Daniel bites down on his lower lip until he tastes his blood, licking it away and hoping the taste will remove the fluttering in his stomach caused the words Fernando said. He grips down harder onto Fernando’s thighs, shoving his cock inside of his body at a wild pace, Fernando’s hole coercing him back inside like Fernando himself keeps on doing as well, over and over these past few months and Daniel can resist, but only for so long.

The scratches on his back are being opened unforgivingly again by Fernando’s blunt nails dragging along his spine, the heels of his feet digging into the vertebrae below his nape and Daniel leans down, covering Fernando’s body as he presses his lips against the blonde’s collarbone, sucking a purple hickey there.

“Own me, own me,” Fernando pleads, his back curving into Daniel’s touch and the dark-haired man moves lower down his chest, the pace of his thrusting going haywire as he sucks on Fernando’s nipple, licking the pert nub and sucking harder. “Fuck,” Fernando drags out the word and he scrambles his hands down to tug and pull at his own weeping cock but Daniel’s hand beat him to it.

Fernando lets his hands drop to the edge of the desk again, his mind vaguely noting the amount of first-timers happening here as Daniel jerks him off, bringing him pleasure at the same pace of his pouncing. “C-Coming,” Fernando mewls and Daniel nods, felt it coming by the way Fernando’s muscles keep clenching around his cock, and he kisses Fernando’s lips to smother the sharp cry coming from the blonde’s lips as he’s coming hard all over Daniel’s hands and his own shirt.

“Fuck, Nando!” Daniel groans out as he feels Fernando clenching his muscles down steadily around him, milking him and he bites down on Fernando’s lower lip as he’s coming inside the condom.

He stays completely still for a few seconds, forehead against forehead with Fernando, who still has his eyes closed and a blissful glow spread over his expression. It takes longer than normal for Daniel to collect himself, to pull out of Fernando and dispose of the condom. He reaches down to pull up his own briefs and pants, doing the same for Fernando who’s still lying back on the desk, chest heaving up and down as if his lungs are searching for air.

Daniel can’t resist a smile, walking over to where his jacket is slumped over the back of the chair and he slings it over his shoulder, grabbing his helmet. He’s about to open the door, but somehow, someway he’s walking back to Fernando, leaning down over the desk to look into his eyes, offering a small smile and a soft kiss on his lips.

The way Fernando looks at him when he pulls back might just be the biggest warning sign of them all.

-

The thing is… Ignoring warning signs is all good and fun for a while. You can relish in the thrill of it, not knowing what is ahead, what you’re being warned for, but in the end, you’re going to crash. You know you will, but you just don’t know when.

-

For Daniel, the day starts like any other Sunday, lazy and filled with sex. Fernando stays over during the weekends because it’s easier and, Daniel takes another bite, he makes the best English breakfast on the planet. The newspaper is open on the football section, Daniel smiles when he sees Liverpool has started winning their games again.

The peacefulness is broken like glass when Fernando storms into the room, only half of his hair styled and his hand is shaking, holding a piece of paper in between his fingers. “What the _fuck_ is this, Daniel?” he demands, teeth gritted tightly on top of each other to try and keep himself as calm as possible.

Daniel stands up languidly from his chair, walking over to Fernando. He crooks his index-finger around a loop on Fernando’s jeans, the other hand reaching up to take the piece of paper Fernando’s holding. There’s a smile on his lips when he sees the writing. “It’s a phone number, Fer.”

Fernando is practically seething right now, Daniel’s uninterested and unfazed expression only making it worse. “I can see that, you fucking cunt,” he spits out. “What I am talking about is that message underneath.”

Daniel just raises an unimpressed eyebrow at Fernando’s swearing and turns his eyes back to the piece of paper. _Call me when you’re back in town, your cock should miss me soon enough – Martin_  

“So?” Daniel turns his gaze back to Fernando. “It’s a badly written, unoriginal booty-call. Besides, he wasn’t that good anyway so I’m not even planning on calling him.”

Disbelief is shooting out of Fernando’s eyes. “Are you fucking daft?” he exclaims, “I’m talking about the fact that you fucked him! When did you do that?”

Daniel sighs deeply, leaning back against the kitchen table. “Why-I don’t know. One week ago, something like that?”

Fernando lets out a sound that isn’t a shriek but it’s not a gasp either. It’s something in between. “One week ago? You fucked someone last _week_?” His eyes are big, the brown looks like it’s been painted over into a darker shade.

“Yes, I fucked someone last week. Dammit, Nando, have you gone deaf or what?” Daniel’s starting to get annoyed at the accusing way the blonde’s looking at him. “I really don’t see what the big deal is, so calm the fuck down.”

“Calm the fuck down?! You cheated on me, you arsehole, and you tell _me_ to calm down?”

Daniel’s laugh is sharp. Ice cold. “ _Cheated?_ Fernando, have you lost your mind? We were never like that, ever.” He emphasizes the last word with his eyes narrowing.

Fernando pulls off the silver ring around his left-hand ring finger. “And this? You fucking gave me this last week. What the fuck, Dan!” He throws the ring against Daniel’s chest. It clatters down onto the hardwood floor.

“I told you!” Daniel exclaims, “It came with the watch I bought and you know I fucking hate jewellery. Giving you a ring doesn’t mean anything to me, Fer, nothing about you, or us or whatever means _anything_ to me, and you need to get that in your fucking love-sick head!”

Daniel knows he’s wrong from the second the words leave his mouth. But he also knows himself, knows that he doesn’t take words back and so he stands there, hands fisted at his sides and all he can do is watch. Watch Fernando’s shoulders fall, the corners of his mouth lowering down, the spark in his eyes fading and Daniel steps forward, grabs Fernando by his biceps but there’s nothing to be done about the _falling_ he sees happening on and in the blonde man.

“You don’t love me?”

Fernando’s voice is hollow, it matches the fading brown in his eyes. Daniel feels words boiling up inside him, trying to find their way to his lips but he swallows them away and says, “No, I don’t.”

He prepares for everything, a mind numbing blow against his jawline, or his nose, or in his groin area, but nothing follows.

Fernando’s just looking at him. “I knew you weren’t brave,” he says. “But I never thought you’d be a coward.”

With those words, he grabs his coat from the rack and opens the front door. The sound of it closing behind him makes Daniel startle.

-

Daniel sees it now. He sees it when he opens up the cabinet in the bathroom, his eyes falling to Fernando’s expensive hair gel. He smells it when he gets inside his car, the faint scent of Fernando’s cologne clinging to the fibres in the passenger’s seat. He feels it aching in his heart when he sees the picture of them at the art gallery, the way he’s looking straight at the camera but Fernando’s eyes were fixed on him. He realises they always had been. At night he lies awake, one second too cold, the other second too warm and he’s left wondering why he never noticed these things whenever Fernando was there.

The weeks pass, the ache in his heart slowly being covered by other things he’s left to worry and think and ponder about. He likes to think he’s forgetting. He’s forgetting the way Fernando’s hair felt underneath the touch of his fingertips, the way his smile seemed different every time but never less unique. He refuses to think of the word beautiful. He’s forgetting and when you forget, you leave it behind.

-

Or so he thought. Because it’s March, another Sunday, when he’s vacuuming his apartment, sliding back the chairs at the kitchen table to reach the spots better and then he hears it. A rattling sound moving up into the vacuum and he sighs, turning the device off and he crouches down. He removes the cap of the vacuum and takes out the cardboard-like bag, his nose wrinkles in disgust as he looks inside and he’s almost putting the bag back into the vacuum when a sudden shimmer catches his eye.

The bag crunches a little when he reaches his hand in, feeling something smooth, cold and delicate between his fingers. He pulls it out and opens the faucet, the clear water cleaning his hands and the object covered in dust. Daniel nearly drops it when he sees what it is. The ring.

Leaning back against the counter, he sighs deeply and turns it around over and over between his fingers. Eventually, he walks over towards his bedroom, finds the original box the ring was in and he takes it back with him to the kitchen. Before he tugs on his shoes and leaves his apartment, he rips a piece of paper from a notebook, and writes down:

_There are not enough days for me to express what I feel for you. But I want to try, Fernando, because trying to tell you how much I love you is better than not saying it at all. - Daniel_

**Author's Note:**

> Reviewing this story would mean the world to me!


End file.
